


Coming Back

by KestrelShrike



Category: Mass Effect, Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Angst, Death, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-12
Updated: 2017-04-12
Packaged: 2018-10-18 04:01:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10608870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KestrelShrike/pseuds/KestrelShrike
Summary: A prompt response that ended up being longer than I intended: An alternative take on the scene where Ryder dies for the second time on the Archon’s flagship, in light of her relationship with Jaal.As always, comments very much appreciated. Still taking prompts!





	

You could always count on SAM to find the way out of a tricky situation, even if his methods weren’t exactly what Wren Ryder wanted to hear. 

“Any idea of how to break out of this?” Stuck within a containment field floating in the belly of the Archon’s flagship, her options seemed limited. Her eyes and mouth could move, but she couldn’t even turn her head to look at Vetra or Jaal, to reassure them that they were not nearly as screwed as they thought they were. Only a little bit screwed. Or a lot. 

“The containment fields only interact with living matter. If you expire, the fields around you will extinguish until manually reset.” Though SAM had the ability to speak only to Ryder’s mind, he spoke out loud now, loud enough that Vetra and Jaal could no doubt hear, if she could only turn her head to see what their faces looked like. “As you know,” SAM continued, “my access to your physiology allows me to enhance your vital signs when required. I can also do the opposite.” 

There was silence after SAM spoke. He phrased it so calmly, so rationally, as only an AI could. Framed in SAM’s terms, it seemed simple. Extinguish your vital signs, Ryder, and you can get out of this field. You can free Jaal and Vetra. But it was never that simple, was it? 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa- kind of don’t want to die today, SAM.” I mean, preferably Ryder won’t die any other day either, but having already died once before, putting her body through that process again seemed unthinkable. There were days her chest still ached and a blind spot crept into her vision, and there were nights she relived it again and again. Flickers of consciousness, memory fading away, Alec’s face as he passed the helm to her, every single nerve in her body on fire... Fuck. Not again. 

“After stopping your heart, I would attempt to resuscitate, of course.” 

“Any other options?” Attempt. Her mind latched onto that word, turning it over and over again. 

“None that I can determine.” If SAM couldn’t calculate a single possibility that didn’t involve Ryder dying, that meant there wasn’t one. It was as simple as that, but laid out in black and white terms, it looked even more bleak. 

“You’ve got to be kidding me, Ryder. You can’t seriously be considering this.” Vetra spoke first, voice steeped in anger. If Ryder closed her eyes, she could imagine the way Vetra would try and clench her fists, the way her shoulders would hunch up just so and her mandibles would clack together in anger. If the situation had been any different, Ryder may even have laughed. 

“Not seeing any other options here, Vetra. I’m really not looking forward to dying again myself.” There was too much resting on that single word. Attempt. Attempt. It repeated in her mind in time to her heartbeat. 

Jaal finally broke her silence. “Ryder, no.” His voice sounded broken, his customary dry humor replaced by emotion that was purely Angaran, the words coming out strangely, as if choked. “I will not lose you.” 

It had been difficult to joke with Vetra, but it was even harder to answer Jaal. “There’s no other way we’ll escape, Jaal. SAM did the math. Besides, he said he can probably bring me back. Probably.” The joke sounded hollow even as she said it, and she cursed herself for it. Stupid Ryder. Maybe you shouldn’t try and joke your way out of every situation. 

“I am not confident in SAM’s abilities to bring you back. Ryder, I can’t lose you.” Again, that repetition- he wouldn’t, he couldn’t. It went from determination to something desperate, clinging to this notion and this idea that she couldn’t leave if he just asked enough times, made his voice forlorn enough. It was good she couldn’t see him properly; he was a pink blur out of the corner of one eye, and even that was distracting enough. 

“Jaal, remember when you showed me your starmap in your room?” The first time they kissed, but not the last. “When this is over, let’s do that again. Build me one we can use in the Tempest. Make it cover the whole ceiling.” She could almost see it, the way the stars and foreign galaxies would swirl across the whiteness of her ceiling, reflecting pinpricks of light down onto her sheets, a pale imitation of what was just outside the window but so much more vast. 

“Ryder…” The fight went out of Jaal’s voice, as if he could slump against the bonds holding them. What else could they say to each other? Her mind was made up, and the job of Pathfinder was so much bigger than what two people shared. 

“I waited six hundred years to meet someone like you, Jaal. Stopping my heart isn’t going to stop me.” Bluffing through it made the prospect of pain less. 

“All right. Let’s do it!” If she put enough excitement into her voice, maybe SAM would understand. 

“Ryder… You’re crazy.” That was Vetra, admiration in her voice plain. 

“It has been a pleasure. I love you, my dearest one.” There was no need to say who that was; tears prickled her eyes, but there was so much riding on this. 

“I love you too, Jaal.” 

“Stopping your heart… now.” And then there was nothing but pain, a pit of darkness she fell into accompanied by nothing. No noise, no sound, no memories. A last flash of thought- if I fuck this up, I’ve fucked it all up, and then… 

A truck was hitting her in the chest, pounding again and again. Every part of her body hurt, not with a dull ache but with a sharp prickle that left her gasping. 

“Stimulating again.” Blackness came creeping back. 

“Why is she not waking up? Try harder!” Jaal’s voice, another hammer to the chest, another wave of black…

And then she opened her eyes, sitting up. Dying the second time hurt slightly less than dying the first time, but there was a moment where she didn’t know where she was, where she wondered why it was so difficult to take a single deep breath. 

“Ryder…” Everything came back in a flood. Rising first to her elbows, and then standing, every limb shook, but she could move again. She was free from the containment field, able to face, Vetra, to offer a smile to Jaal that physically hurt her face to make. 

“I told you I’d be back. I can’t just leave you here, Jaal. You think I’d cross galaxies, meet my dream man, and then just leave him?” Every word hurt, a knife in her chest. Every step was a lance of pain, but it was already growing dull. SAM was flooding her system with something that took the edge off, and though she knew she would regret it later, Ryder couldn’t stop now. Too much to do, no time to stop. 

Limping, she managed to walk over to the console controlling the field, slamming her fist into it and sending her friends to the ground. It would be so nice to rest… If she could just lean against it for a minute, she could close her eyes, get her strength back…

Jaal’s arms were around her, crushing her tight, but it was a good pain. It was the pain of being alive when she really, really shouldn’t have been, his lips in her hair and then at her ear, and then finally finding her mouth. He clung to her but he also supported her, the warmth of his body and the familiar scent of the lotions he used on his skin and the oils he used on his gun bleeding into her mind. 

“That’s twice now I’ve come back from the dead. Can’t say the experience is improving,” she choked out, as they stepped away from each other. Then she laughed until she cried, sound faintly hysterical, before wiping off her eyes. 

“Let’s go. Let’s do this.” There would be more later, but for now her hand slipped into Jaal’s for just a moment, and she squeezed it. When Vetra’s head was turned, she mouthed the words a second time. “I love you.” For now, it would have to be enough.


End file.
